Antisemitic crimes may be funded overseas, say Australian police

Australia's federal police have said they are investigating whether "overseas actors or individuals" are paying local criminals to carry out antisemitic crimes in the country.

There has been a spate of such incidents in recent months, the latest of which saw a childcare centre in Sydney set alight and sprayed with anti-Jewish graffiti. No-one was injured.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called a snap cabinet meeting in response, where officials agreed to set up a national database to track antisemitic incidents.

Thus far, the federal police taskforce, set up in December to investigate such incidents, received more than 166 reports of antisemitic crimes.

Albanese said it appeared some of the crimes were "being perpetrated by people who don't have a particular issue, aren't motivated by an ideology, but are paid actors".

"Now, it's unclear who or where the payments are coming from," he told reporters on Wednesday.

Australian Federal Police (AFP) Commissioner Reece Kershaw said it was possible that cryptocurrencies - which can take longer to identify - had been used.

He added that police were also investigating whether young people were carrying out these crimes and whether they had been radicalised online.

However, Mr Kershaw cautioned, "intelligence is not the same as evidence" and more charges were expected soon.

Last week, a man from Sydney became the first person to be charged by the federal taskforce, dubbed Special Operation Avalite, over alleged death threats he made towards a Jewish organisation.

Albanese said Tuesday's incident at a childcare centre in the eastern Sydney suburb of Maroubra was "as cowardly as it is disgusting" and described it as a "hate crime".

"This was an attack targeted at the Jewish community. And it is a crime that concerns us all because it is also an attack on the nation and society we have built together," he wrote on social media.

Melbourne's Addas Israel synagogue was set alight in December while people were inside

Israel's deputy foreign minister told the ABC that Australia's government had been "inflaming" problems in the local community by not clamping down harder on antisemitic crimes.

But Albanese on Wednesday said his government had "acted from day one" to protect Australia's Jewish community, and criticised those seeking to make it a "political issue".

The Jewish Council of Australia, which was set up last year in opposition to antisemitism, said that it "strongly condemns" this and all such incidents.

"These acts underscore the urgent need for cooperation, education and community dialogue to combat prejudice and promote understanding," it said in a statement.

Most of the recent incidents have taken place in Sydney and have involved antisemitic graffiti, arson and vandalism of buildings including synagogues.

New South Wales has set up its own state-level taskforce to address these incidents and more than 35 people have been charged so far with antisemitism-related offences. These include a 33-year-old man who was charged on Wednesday over an attempt to set fire to a synagogue earlier this month.

A further 70 arrests have been made for similar crimes in the neighbouring state of Victoria, where a synagogue was set on fire last month.

On Wednesday, police said they had charged a 33-year-old Sydney man over the